Former Minnesota Gov. Jesse Ventura won $1.8 million Tuesday in his two-year fight to prove he was defamed by a military sniper and best-selling author who claimed to have punched out Ventura at a bar for bad-mouthing the Navy SEALs. A federal jury in St. Paul sided with Ventura in his lawsuit against American Sniper author Chris Kyle, who was killed last year in Texas. Though Ventura honed a tough-guy reputation as a pro wrestler and action movie actor, he maintained the legal battle was about clearing his name among his beloved fellow Navy SEALs, not about losing a supposed fight to Kyle. Kyle said in his memoir that he punched Ventura in California in 2006 after Ventura said the SEALs "deserved to lose a few" in Iraq. Ventura disputed that the confrontation, including the punch, ever happened.

Pollution could cost U.S. $150B

Failing to adequately reduce the carbon pollution that contributes to climate change could cost the U.S. economy $150 billion a year, according to an analysis by the White House Council of Economic Advisers released Tuesday. The report is part of the White House's effort to increase public support for President Barack Obama's climate-change agenda, chiefly an Environmental Protection Agency proposal targeting coal-fired power plants, the nation's largest source of planet-warming pollution. The EPA is holding public hearings on the proposal this week in Washington, Atlanta, Denver and Pittsburgh.

German woman killed by cows

A herd of cows attacked and killed a German woman hiking through the animals' fenced-in pasture in Austria after apparently being riled by the sight of her leashed dog, police said Tuesday. They said the 45-year-old victim was rushed by about 20 cows and their calves. The attack occurred Monday in Austria's Tyrol province. Under confidentiality rules, her name was not released.

By the Numbers

25.01 Miles traveled on Mars by NASA's rover Opportunity, a record for a wheeled vehicle on another world. The Soviet Union's Lunokhod 2 rover landed on the moon in 1973 and drove 24.2 miles.